Yorshaan
General information Warning: this is classical Yorshaan and would never be significantly modified. A new version based on it would be Modern Yorshaan . Yorshaan language (Yorshaan: Yorshohtten /ˌjoɹʃoxˈtˤen/) is a language spoken by Yorshaan people. Yorshaan is known to be a language isolate, though most people speaking it live in Europe near the Alps. As for most people,Yorshaan could be a "solemn language" like Hebrew. Rhymes are crucial in Yorshaan. As shown in the map at right, most of Yorshaan people dwell in the west-north Atra, which causes a lot of trouble (i.e. separatism). The referedum about the independence of Republic of Yorshaa was once held, but it turned out that the republic failed to establish. Yorshaan people.png|The distribution of Yorshaan people in Europe. The red region suggests that Yorshaan people is the majority there. YORandATR.png|A polandball comic about the Yorshaan problem. whatareoftalking.jpg|That's what would happen when a Basque meets a Yorshaan, since both Basque and Yorshaan are language isolate. Spanish, French, and Atramia are all Roman languages, so none of the three countryballs understand both Basqueball or Yorshball. Phonology Alphabet Because the latin alphabet was introduced by German languistics, the names of these alphabets are effected and may sound like those in German. Consonants Traditionally the consonants of Yorshaan consist of two groups: front and back consonants. The border is set between alveolar and postalveolar consonants. Learning whether a sound is "front" is critical for learning Yorshaan nouns. #Pronounced in front of "u" as in "dawuu" /dɑˈβuː/ (greed). #See the next section. #It becomes /ç/ after the vowel "i", /ɧ/ when followed by "y", /ʍ/ when followed by "w". #The digraph "lh" is ponounced /ʟ/ only before front vowels such as æ, œ, e, and i. Otherwise it would be /l/ as in the word lhantuu. This could happened before Early Modern Yorshaan. #H sounds (h, hy, and hw) are silent at the end of a word. It's believed that they were once pronounced in Old Yorshaan, but involved into /ɰ/. They dropped eventually as in Early Modern Yorshaan. #It's believe that there were once /ts/ and /dz/ in Yorshaan, but somehow they became dental consonants. #/m/ becomes /ɱ/ before f or v. "Tosa Clozlospyull" As mentioned in the last section, there can be at most 5 varients of the alveolar plosive: /t̪/, /t̻/, /tʲ/, /tʷ/, and /tˤ/. Consonants like the letter t possessing five varients are called "Tosa Clozlospyull (6-varient sound) in Yorshaan, comprising t and d. Whearas Tosa Sehlospye, a 4-varient consonant, doesn't have dental nor laminal varient. It is believed that there were once dental sibilant /s̪/ and /z̪/, but somehow became non-sibilant as what we use now:/θ/ and /ð/. As for 3-varient consonants, they are lack of pharyngealized form, yet still able to be labialized or palatalized. Further more, there is even Tosa Csyerlospye (0-varient consonant). That is, they can't be dentalized, laminalized, palatalized, labialized, nor pharyngealized. The letter h is still being argued nowadays, since its palatalization and labialization is not so "perfect" or even able to be regarded as another sound, making them not standard varients. *6-varient Consonant: d, t. *4-varient Consonant: s, z. *3-varient Consonant: p, b, f, v, m, n, l, r. *The rest goes into 0-varient consonant. Vowels Clusters Yorshaan allows consonant clusters to appear, yet their voiceness must be the same. In most cases, the first consonant affects the second one. There could only be two consonants in a cluster. Take Ponigt (Honored us) for example, the cluster gt /gd/ is affected by the g''. Special Combinations Pronouns Personal Demonstrative Personal demonstratives are now only used for honorifics. The term "raze" shows lower status, while "Stazen" stands for people of higher rank. Additionally, the first letter of "Stazen" must be upper case and be in the front of a sentence all the time. The term "maze" has become rare. *'Stazosy nuta sæysac......(If you, whom I cherished, are tired of war......) *'Stazen '''præ joltot? (''My lord, who hurt you?) All the demonstrative pronouns have the same ending as V-nouns (absolutive) and can also be seen as V-nouns. Demonstrative Determiner The -''m'' suffix appears when the determiner follows a vowel-opening word. For example: *bina (country) *rei binae (this country) *utye (song) *stei'''m utyei /ˌst̪eɪ̯m uˈtʲeɪ̯/ (that song) Interrogative and Relative Pronouns It's more like a noun that declines rather than several pronouns according to its grammatical role. All the pronouns decline as the I nouns, except that these pronouns don't have definite form. All interrogative pronouns must be at the head of a sentence. *'Prœ'ABS mimei du? (Who do you love?) *'Prosu'ERG joltot do? (Who hurt you?) *'Prosaut'DAT stei mabei griynei du? (Whom do you give that letter to?) *'Œprœ'ABS ithot do? (Whom did you run away from?) *'Prosay'INSTR du fronei maha? (Whom do you turn into a pig?) *'Prosi'jicaGEN ohy? (Whose book is this?) *'PROSAA'VOC! (WHO!) Relative pronouns, or exactly relativizer, is the adjunct form of those interrogative pronouns. Together with a hyphen, Yorshaan create relative clauses with these adjuncts. *Lenosy ohy rei melai prosum-mimei cu. (Lena is the girl whom I love.) *Rei melui prosum-mimon'' co'' cœlcein anyada.(The girl who loved me jumped down the bridge.) Certainly there would be such situation like the shared noun plays as different grammatical roles in both relative and main clause. As for the relativizer, it always plays the role in the relative clause. *'U' prosar-griynei rei mabei cu ohy Lenen. (Who I gave this letter to is Lena.) *Lenosy ohy e''' prosar-griynei rei mabei cu. (Lena is who I gave this letter to.) *'''U presum-dagohy cu jolta icivordue. (What I've seen hurts my mind.) As the examples above, the pronoun "U" (he ergative) becomes introductory. Nouns Nouns of Yorshaan can be devided in four groups according to the ending of its singular indefinite absolutive form. The nouns of first and second groups are countable, the difference between both of the groups is the last consonant of the stem of their elements. The third group contains uncountable nouns, while the fourth group comprises proper nouns (or honorified nouns). Numerals in Yorshaan have their own declension, though. History The history of Yorshaan nouns are not much certain because of the lack of proper record of Yorshaan before the introduction of Latin alphabets. The most believed theory is that there were once at least four kinds of declension in Middle Yorshaan, two of which became one and splitted into two groups during the consonant separation (between Late Middle Yorshaan and Early Modren Yorshaan). The fourth declension was said to be once a series of suffixes to express honorfics. Not all members of a group would enter the corresponding group in Middle Yorshaan. Group I Linguists believe that the division of group I and group II is due to distinguishing front consonants from back ones, which might happen in Early Modren Yorshaan. Most suffixes of the group I nouns are back vowels, and most members of this group have back consonants as their ending. #The prefix of ablative nouns agrees with the first vowel of the noun. Take "bina" for example, the prefix here is "i-". This rule also suits for other groups of nouns. #This case is actually a prefix form of a noun referring to some certain relations in Yorshaan, thus it's lack of adjunct form. Group II There are still some exceptions of the noun rule. Nouns ending in one of four letters, l, r, t, and d, can be either group I or II, though all four of them is front consonants. However, nouns with those palatalized can only be group II, whereas ones with those labialized or pharyngealized (if possible) can only go into group I. Group III Nouns in this group are uncountable. Thus such nouns are ocassionally called abstract nouns. Group IV This sort of noun are sometimes called "Honorified Noun" due to its usage. S-Nouns comprise proper nouns and nouns that are honorified, such as Anglen (England), Atren (Atramia), Jiwen (Jew), Christyen (Christian), and the most typical Stazen (You whom we cherished) Names in Yorshaan Personal names of people are considered S-nouns too, but their absolutive form is the same as vocative form. Besides, there is always a hyphen between the suffix and the name stem. Though the pronunciation isn't affected. *Ramenz! *Ithaa Ramenz-iht! (Dash with Ramenz!) Cases able to reflect Yorshaan is lack of the idea of preposition (ie of, by, etc). The verb-like word is used instead. That is, there might be a word that act like a verb and an adjective (or a noun) at the same time. In other words, only verbs are allowed to be followed by another noun, and a preposition must be verb form. Usually one case can be considered stems of verbs in Yorshaan: the instrumental case. It refers to tool and agent. The reflectable case of I noun follows the rule of I verb, while those of II and III nouns follow the rules of II verb. That of proper nouns reflect as III verbs. Take the noun "ucethuu" (loyality) or example: *ucethuu (absolutive) *ucethafh (instrumental) *Coi ucethafh'aa'! (Be loyal to me!)(Lit. Do the royality to me!) In such way, one can also express how the relation was/is/will be happened. The reflection of the stem from I-nouns are the same as I-verbs, while other nouns follow the rule of Allative case The term "allative case" isn't quite formal, but the case can be seen as an extra usage of dative case (in contrast to ablative case). *Shujhend'emc' pserat cradaz. (The humans were banished to the wilderness.) *'U'''shujhende pserat cradaz. (The humans were banished '''from' the wilderness.) *E pserat A'zarlyen shujhend'emc. (He was banished from Zarlia to the wilderness.) Reflexive case There is no specific reflection for reflexive cases in Yorshaan, though it was done by combining the absolutive form with hyphen and its ergative ending. *crada (person) *cradu (person (agent)) *crad'a-u' (person himself) *mei crad'ai-ui' (the person himself) *c'o-u' (I myself) *Swan'az-uz' orvegs. (Siblings killed each other.) Definiteness There are some ways in Yorshaan to mark a noun's deifniteness. The most common way is to via particle rei and rœe, besides the prefix that implys the genitive case of other nouns and pronouns. *mela (a girl)(indefinite) *mela'i' (the girl)(definite)(illegal) *'rei' melai (the girl) *'ici'melai (my girl)(ici- my) *'bini'melai (the girl that belongs to a kingdom) *'binoi'melai (the girl that belongs to the kingdom) *'Thushenca'melai (the girl from Thushenk) Genetive Case Verbs Regular Verbs Main Article: Yorshaan Regular Verb Most verbs in Yorshaan are regular and can be roughly sorted into 3 groups:I (G), II (M), and III (D) verb. Each of them are quite different from another one. The first group of regular verbs changes its last vowel of the stem. Each of these verb group has its very own infinite form ending. The list below shows the form that are always appear on the dictionary (present passive independent form). *I verb: -eem *II verb: -aam *III verb: -us And here's three small tables that presents the reflection (realis mood) of three verb groups. Take dœneem (sing), calaam (breath), and butus (awake) for examples: Irregular Verbs Main Article: Yorshaan Irregular Verb Yorshaan does have some verbs that doesn't follow the regular rule of verbs (three kinds of ocnjugation). Whether a verb is regular can only be memorized if its infinite form has the same ending as other regular verbs. Optative in Yorshaan There are 4 moods at total in Yorshaan:1) realis, 2) optative, 3) subjunctive and 4) imperative. The optative mood refers to the wish or willing of the speaker, light command or request to the adressee, and so on. 1) A wish or willing Optative often refers to the hope of the speaker, who wants something to be done or be into a state. *'Nacrosh'. (I want to cry.) *Du omunzwits siza. (I want you to be a hero in the future.) *'Pseri' co. (I want to go.) When the adverb sil is introduced, the meaning would change. It would be prohibition, prevention, or disapproval. *Sil nacrosh. (I don't want to cry.) *Sil pseri do. (I don't want you to go.) *Sil pseruiwerus e. (He deosn't want to go.) 2) A guess or imagination In addition to wishes, optative can express guess or imagination, as the speaker is uncertain about something. *'Alvafhinth'. (It could probably rain now.) *U mei dena ohyom. (Maybe she is the girl.) *U mei dena omomwits. (Maybe she will become the girl.) The adverb sil here shows the negative guess. *U mei dena sil ohyom. (Maybe she's not the girl.) 3) Regret This function can only be realized by past optative. Since the past couldn't be altered, one who wishes can only regret. *U mei dena ogomwe. (It would be great if she was the girl.) The adverb sil refers to that the speaker doesn't want something to happen in the past. *Cu sil orvol. (I shouldn't have killed you.)(I'm sorry that I killed you.)(It would be good if I didn't kill you.) 4) Rhetorical question Optative can also be used in a question to form a rhetorical one. *Prœ psera roanemc? (Who comes here?) *Prœ pserin roanemc? (Who would ever want to come to such a place?) Infinitive Dependent and Infinitive Independent There are two forms of a infinitive form of a verb: infinitve dependent and independent. An infinitive independent always stands alone, while an infinitive dependent can only rely on another verb or even nouns. Infinitives in Yorshaan have various usages. 1) Introductory word Infinitive independent is often used to introduce a noun phrase (acting as a stem of a III noun). Infinitive dependent is more like an extra information for those depended verbs. *'Degichentsafh' hamiys mela joltinc ilu co argrale ays.(To see''' a lovely being hurt by an adult really makes me angry.) *'Dageemafh''' Vernosy maygull co argrafho fis.(''Being seen by Verna in that way also makes me angry.) *Ijatithi'fenedidgentsuu''' vozcraduu œr presay-cesalen Manen cozweralen melaut mimiys mustull dun.(''Trying to convince everyone that Mana was wrong was impossible for such a weak girl at that time.) A Yorshaan infinitive has passive form and antipassive form at the same time. Whether to use either voice depends on the arguments in the noun phrase. For example, in the first sentence, there is an absolutive noun ''mela, which suggests that the absent argument of the verb "see" should be ergative. Since the infinitive takes the place of the absent noun, it then become antipassive voice. Infinitive dependent, as ijatithi in the third example sentence, attaches to another verb (here an infinitive). The term "ijatithi" couldn't be alone in a sentence. Together with the infinitive fenedidgents forms another infinitive '''''ijatithifenedidgents (to try to convince). Whether the infinitive is passive voice or not doesn't effect what case it should be in. As for its tense, its always same as the verb which takes the infinitive as its argument. In the third example sentnece, the infinitives ijatithifenedidgentsuu is in past tense. An introductory word formed by infinitives must receive a III noun suffix. 2) Additional information Infinitive dependent can also be seen the addition of meaning to other verbs. In this case, one would see an infinitive prefix and a verb that reflects. *Reigio œnfue bœza cu. (I '''can handle' the future.) *Reigio œnfue '''dagobœza' cu. (I '''can see' the future.) *Reigio œnfue '''bavabœza' cu. (I '''can save' the future.) *Do cu '''ijatithifeneda'. (I '''tried to convince' you.) This funciotn implies that '''there is no such idea as auxiliary verbs in Yorshaan'. The verb bœzeem (can, able to do, handle, deal with) is able to stand alone in a sentence, while can can't. In this case, the infinitive is always passive. 3) As a result of the previous verb Infinitive independent is also used to describe a result action of another verb. Like most infinitives after a verb in English, and a verb in front of another verb with a particle て between them in Japanese. Im comparision: *'起きて'顔を洗う。 *I woke up to wash my face. *Butot mandith icifanda. The infinitive here is in past tense, and receive a corresponding suffix -''ith'', unlike English or Japanese, both of which doesn't mark the tense of the infinitive. The structure also allows a noun to be the argument of both verb, but its c ase depends on the previous verb (not the infinitive one). *Sheve co orvidgents e. (I was asked to kill him.) When there is a noun between both the finitive and infinitive verb, the voice of infinitive one depends on the role of the noun to the infinitive. However, the infinitiv is always passive while there's nothing between the verbs. In the last example sentence, the noun co (I'') is ergative to the term ''orvidgents e (kill him). 4) As a manner of the previous verb To be percise, this is somehow informal. Similar to Japanese particle て, infinitive in casual usage can also refer to the method of how a verb is done. In very formal use, this should be done via the instrumental case of the gerund. *'走って'来る。 *I came with my running. *(informal) Pserot ithith. *(formal) Pserot ithidufh. In this case, the infinitive is always passive. Imperative Mood Imperative mood, unlike other moods, has two voices: passive and antipassive voices. In the passive (casual voice in Yorshaan), the adressee always plays the absolutive role in the sentence. Take the verb dageem (to see) example, its passive imperative dagea would be "Show yourself!" (Be seen!), while the antipassive imperative dagaha would then be "Look!". Copula There are several copulative verbs in Yorshaan, and the most common one is alonzh. Take "be happy" for example. *Co sarale. (I am happy.) The term sarale comprises two parts:1) sar, the stem of saruu (happiness) and 2) ale, the present first person singular form of alonzh. Together with other arguments to express more meaning: *Co sarale rœe jicacte. (These books makes me happy.) *Con sarale. (I'm a tool used to please other people.) *Co ale gotaut sariys. (I'm like a happy bird.) *''(Cf.) Cu ihy gota sariys. (''I'm a happy bird.) Remember that the verb alonzh is intransitive. In the 3rd example sentence the word gotaut is dative case of gota. Negative form of participles The suffix "ei" to all 3 regular groups of verbs represents negation. *asany (ending) *asany'ei' (never ending) Voice for participles Yorshaan has two voices, passive and antipassive voice, which can only be realized by participles though. Participles of some verbs are lack of either of two voices, but they all look like those in passive voice. Generally speaking, each group of verbs has its own infix for the antipassive voice participle. All antipassive participles of I verbs have the same stem as that in past tense. *Mei sontue egfortiavesy. (The history destined to be fortold.) *Rei sragai egfortesy. (The child destined to fortell.) *Mei sontue egfortiavesy 'rei sragui. (''The history destined to be fortold by the child.) *Rei sragai 'egfortesy '''mei sontue. (''The child destined to fortell the history.) Adjectives and Adverbs The boundary between adjectives and adverbs in Yorshaan is not so clear as English or other languages. For example, a word "ustiys" might be: *Itha '''ustiys. (He runs rapidly.) *Ohy ustiys. (He is rapid.) The "ustiys" in the first sentence is actually adverb, and in the second one is adjective (as a subject complement). However, the difference is the location of stress. The stress falls on the first syllable of an adjective, and the last syllable of an adverb. See the stress section below for more information. Adjunct in different cases Remember that adjuncts and nouns don't agree in case. An adjunct in instrumental case can modify a noun in ergative case. Since the adjunct form of a noun can be seen as "modifying form of a noun", each case of a adjunct has its very own meaning regardless the noun it modifies. But the absolutive and ergative adjunct share the same word (in other words, there's no difference.), and the vocative and genetive case doesn't exist. Comparasion There are four degrees of comparasion in Yorshaan: positive, comparative, relative superlative, and absolute superlative. Like Greek. The comparasion form of adjectives and adverbs share the same spelling as well. While comparing other things, these comparative (or relative superlative) adjuncts can be seen as III-verbs stems. According to the penult vowel, these verb stems can be devided into two groups. *III-E: a, e, i, æ (unround vowel) *III-O: o, u, œ (round vowel) The syntax here is fixed, things that are compared must be put behind the adjunct. That is: *Ihy fahijore do. (I'm more powerful than you.) *Ahy lontuzyiyso ce! (You are as blind as us!) The tense, mood and aspect shall be the same as the verb. The person and the number of the adjunct depends on the compared object. *Sil uniy œrveem-'bœzeg' lyepijora e, Jomt prœ. (No one can kill other people more cruelly than him, Jomt.) *Jomtosy og mei cradai lyepijaran fronzyœ Yorshin. (Jomt was the most cruel man of the Yorshaan princes.) *Jomtosy og mei Atracradai lyepijaran. (Jomt was the most cruel man in(of) Atramia.) Numeral The system of Yorshaan numerals is decimal. All the numerals are written in Arabic numbers. Generally speaking, there are two numeral systems of Yorshaan. One of them is native, and the other origined from Latin since Yorshaan has been affected by Romance languages. How both the numeral systems work in the past is still unkown, but in Early Modern Yorshaan the most used system is actually a mixture of the both systems above. The word "nula" actually means the number "0". In Early Modern Yorshaan, there are two ways for these numerals to modify a noun: either drop its last vowel or add a suffix -um. The former refers to the quantity of the modified noun, while the latter means the related property of the number. *Haja elt. (Four taboos) *Haja eltum. (Taboo of four) Counter Word There are some counter words in Yorshaan. These counter words attach to the back of the modified nouns. *Ur jas'naze'. (A cup of water.) *Rei jas'nazu'. (This cup of water.) Ordinal Numeral To express the order or ranking, one has only to add the word "paja" (literally ranking) after the numerals. The modified noun is always definite. *Rolzet fat. (Five months.) *Rolz'u'''t '''fatpajum'. (The fifth month.) Large Numbers The common form of larger numbers in Yorshaan is "smallerGENbiggerAdjunct-number". As for the number 800, the smaller number would be 8 and the larger one be 100, thus its Yorshaan is octithœle. *24: Sadum-elta. (Twenty four.) *841: Octithœlum-fimfum-ura. (Eight hundred forty one) When 0 is introduced, for short it would only be nul or even omitted. *2043: Duhiændum-(nul)-fimfum-seha, sadum-fimfum-seha. (Two thousand and forty three, twenty forty three.) Compound To form compuond, one can easily piece together the stems of nouns. *Lhascrada (magician): lhas- (magic) + crada (man) *Omvyole (age of darkness): om- (darkness) + vyole (age, era) The order of the words does effect the meaning. *Getarcrada (fortune teller) *Cradgetara (fate of a human) Gerunds of verbs can also take part in, but not the stem of verbs. *Esarfilla (ending chapter): esar- (end) + filla (chapter) *Asfilla (wrong, though as is the verb stem of esaruu.) Syntax The word order of Yorshaan is somehow uncertain and unpredictable as for a declarative sentence. But the AEV form (absolute-ergative-verb) is the most common form. Do joltot cu. ' A' V''' '''E I hurt you. Omiys aena id cu bavict. ' A ' E''' '''V I shall release your darkened soul. Question The interrogative pronouns must be in the front of a sentence, after the honorific pronoun "Stazen". *Pre bœzeg masaam du? (What can you do?) *Pro co du joltot? (Did you hurt me?) Participle Clause Participles in Yorshaan can be used as adjuncts or participles that form a clause. When forming a clause, the present participle often stands for active voice, while the past one refers to passive voice. Generally speaking, this pattern can be seen as: N PART (A...), where N refers to the modified noun, PART to participle, and (A...) to (no) argument(s). *Crada nacain. (A person (who was) believed in.) *Cradaz nacœnhain. (People who religiously believe.) *Cradaz nacœnhain Stazen. (People who believe in you, whom we cherish.) Appositive The word "pre" (absolutive what) is used to describe the appositive of a noun.(prounced as /pɹɨ/) Some possible structures might look like English. *Lanstin, unit crada gubiciys pre, bailyolt. (Lanstin, a rich man, giggles all the time.) Participle Construction Besides participles, adjectives can also be used to construct clauses. Adverbs can also be separated from the main sentence though, their grammatic role is very different. The word pre is attached to the modified noun regardless of its case. *'Sil roane', premc pre. Sil styone, pyoremc pre. (The place where is not here. The distination where is not thither.) *Birdain noneln, u pre saysohy vozuu. (He who wanders in the world is tired of everything.) Conditional Sentence Unlike other sentences, the word order of conditional sentences of Yorshaan must be either VEA or VAE, and the verb must be subjunctive mood. That is, the first word of a conditional sentence must be a subjunctive verb. One important thing is that the tense of the subjunctive verb refers to the time when condition happens, unlike English. *Prœ ohy du, sil yisca 'Lanstin du? (''If you weren't Lanstin, then who are you?)(Lit. Who are you, if you are not Lanstin?) *Æscœshtec do en, nyo nastiduvale. (If you sacrifice for us, we will be very sad.) Conjunction "a" A common conjunction in Yorshaan is "a" /ɤ/, used to connect two things having the same level together. It resembles "and" in English. *Præ nijan a prœ nijan. (Those who are invade and those who are being invaded.) In informal usage, the object after the conjunction "a" can be shorten and with the conjunction and hyphens form a word. The same part as the previous object is removed. *Edriys 'a-nast '(a nastiys) none. (Painful and sad world.) *Pre mlamiom sontuu ohy dœssœrfiom '''a-ie-any (a diessiefany)! (Falsifying the history is and will never be forgivable!) Stress Stress sits at the last syllable in absolutive and vocative noun, but not in other cases. In words with more than three syllables, the stress often falls on the antepenult (the third syllable from the last). Once the noun is absolutive or vocative, the stress always falls on its last syllable (And the one that falls on antepenult becomes secondary stress). Stress in verb is less common, but they always appear in the first syllable of optative perfect and subjuncitve perfect forms. Stress of positive (non-comparative) adjectives always locate on the first syllable. On contrary, the stress of adverbs falls on the lasy syllable. Unstress These phenomena happen in a unstressed syllable that can be stressed in other cases (with the same spelling). *The /j/ consonant after a vowel or palatalization of a consonant would be removed. *"o" after another vowel changes from /o/ to /ɤ/. *A vowel followed by /l/, /ʎ/, /m/, or /n/ reduces to schwa /ə/. While some always happen. *Any vowel in the syllable in font of a secondary stress becomes schwa /ə/. Though such phenomenon often happen in words comprising more than 3 syllables. *"a" reduces from /ɑ/ to /ʌ/ when not stressed (or at a secondary stress). That is, such phenomena would happen on the last syllable of "ato'miys'" (elegent) but never the second syllable of lo'sye'niys (arrogant). Its pronunciation is either /ˈlosʲenis/ (as an adjective) or /losʲeˈnijs/ (as an adverb). Labialization, Palatalization, and Pharyngealization Labialization and Palatalization Both labialization and palatalization is common in Yorshaan together with two letters "w" and "y" after another consonant. Yes, silimar to Russian, labialization and palatalization do make difference between words. Consider the two pairs of words: *s'w'''ede /sʷeˈde/ (''ocean) vs sede /seˈde/ (earthworm) *un'y'''uu /uˈnʲuː/ (''east) vs unuu /uˈnuː/ (time) But labialization and palatalization can sometimes be removed due to stress. See the stress section below. Alternation of Labialization Be aware that Yorshaan doesn't allow the labialization (and /w/) appear in front of the vowel /u/. As their alternation, and /β/ make appearance. That is: *s'wu'teem /sβuteːm/ (to detect) *s'wi'ne /sʷɪˈne/ (I was detected.) W-Hyasa In other words, "W-replacement". Such phenomenon only appears in the fourth declension of noun (sometimes called honorified noun), when the noun is refecting. Once a word stem ends with "y", the "y" must removed in order to attach the affix "wech" and "wach", which mean dative and genetive. *Rush'y'''en (''Russia) *Rush'w'''ach (''Things belonging to Russia) *Rush'w'''ar (''of Russia) *Anglen (England) *Anglwar (of England) Pharyngealization Pharyngealization is, however, less common than either labialization or palatalization in Yorshaan. The process is denoted by doubling the letter (Some letters are doubled without pharyngealization). Only t, d, s, and z can be pharyngealized (tt, dd, ss, and zz), which makes the process less common. *bœ'ss'œzeem /beˈsˤøze:m/ (to beunable to do) *'ss'abzaam /sˤʌbza:m/ (to stare) *oh'tt'a /oxˈtˤɑ/ (language) *ca'zz'uu /kʌˈzˤu:/ (power) Vocabulary The lexicon of Yorshaan can be seen here: Yorshaan Lexicon. Also there's another dictionary on conworkshop . Relation with Atramia people Atramia people live near where Yorshaan people do, hence its normal to see some Yorshaan words appear in Atramia language and vice versa. On account to some historical reasons, Atramia people have seen Yorshaan as a "low level language" (Lingueğ Disim) and been sick of it for a long period of time. On the other hand, the Yorshaan people consider those Atramia people "arrogant travelers from the east" (Losyeniys Ænarmyancradaz). Most of Yorshaan people believe in their ancient religion, whereas a number of Atramia people believe in Christianity. That's often a tricky problem between Atramia and Yorshaan society. Example text Sil shailhaha Lafrente. Don't forget it, Lafrente. Ohy meim minods nadipoctai icimilœmamuloiseun. It's the eighth birthday of my beloved daughter. Iliaduan mei helsluyevhai, ur jate hahamescei siewa. If the candle goes out, a river that can't be crossed will apear. «Si!» U zoda icurtitrutet, flawat e presum «Sil do ijazofram. Eulss do coi, co sarale, prenum!» "No!" She grabbed the corner of my shirt and murmured, "I don't want you to leave. As long as you are around me, I will be happy no matter what!" Category:Languages Category:Yorshaan